Thank you. Sometimes I feel like Don Quixote tilting at windmills. It is
very important to me that our arguments be correct.
. In the example you gave, the lambda repressor, one still needs some
further information to calculate the odds of chance formation. I would not
reject the odds of chance formation until the following information is
available How many 99 residure proteins perform the function? 98? etc What
is the shortest sequence which will perform this function? And at what
efficiency do you say that the protein no longer has the functionality. (I
presume that not all sequences are equally efficient.)
For instance, according to Edward O. Dodson and Peter Dodson,( _Evolution:
Process and Product_, Van Nostrand, 1976, p. 340) cytochrome C sequences
range in length from 103 to 112 residues. If this applies to the Lambda
repressor, then there may be more than 10^55 sequences which can be modified
to perform this function. This would imply that one can use a method
similar to what I used with words to manufacture a long sequence containing a
shorter functional sequence within it. Then the long sequence can be cut to
produce the functional sequence.
For this reason, I would not rule out, just yet, the ability to find a
functional sequence by chance. I may be committing the "fallacy" that Brian
Harper suggested that the T.O. folk do, but I am not sure that they are
wrong. But I do agree with Terry, that selection is a very powerful search
algorithm in the type of functional space that protein sequences seem to
have..
One final thought.Having once been an anti-evolutionist, YEC, I know that
there are some YEC's reading these things that I post, who do not like what I
am saying. When I was a YEC, I didn't like hearing these things. . These
problems caused me lots of pain, but I always figured that in the future we
would have an explanation. But ultimately, it came down to the fact that I
would never solve those problems. And the list of problems was just simply
too long. That is why I had to re-evaluate everything that Christianity was
doing in the area of apologetics. I am not an enemy of Christianity but
merely trying to fix what I sincerely see as broken in our apologetics.
My views, outlined in my book, may ultimately turn out to be wrong. But with
the exception, currently, of the MHC problem, my views match all the data I
have encountered - geology, astronomy, math, physics and biology. That is
why I am excited about them. For the nonchristian who reads this board,
before you reject Chistianity because you think it can not be harmonized
with modern science, consider the view I am advocating which can be found in
an August post entitled New View. For the YEC, my view will give you what
you really want -- a historically accurate Bible. As an ex-YEC, isn't that
what we really want? For my more liberal brothers in Christ, my views can
show you that you don't have to reject scientific data to have a
non-allegorical Bible. It is in everybody's interest to achieve some peace
between Scripture and science.
glenn
16075 Longvista Dr.
Dallas, TX 75248